Page 32 of The Next Person You Meet in Heaven
Annie moved slightly. The eyes followed.
“Are you here for me?” Annie asked, tentatively.
“Are you here for me?” a voice echoed.
Annie looked around.
“Do I know you?” Annie said.
“Do I know you?” it echoed again.
Annie leaned in and squinted. The eyes squinted back. Annie recoiled. She saw these eyes every day in the mirror.
“You’re... me?” Annie said.
No response.
“Say something.”
The eyes stared upwards.
“What are you looking at?”
With that, the pink snow rumbled and the five peninsulas curled in like fingers. Annie realized she was not on an island at all, but inside the palm of a giant hand.
“Hello, sweetheart.”
Annie trembled.No, she thought, recognizing the voice immediately. She raised her eyes to where the angel’s eyes were looking, and the sky filled with the most familiar face of her life.
“Mom?” Annie whispered. “Is it you?”
Annie Makes a Mistake
She is twelve years old. She is starting middle school. She hopes it will be better than elementary school. By the time Lorraine finally enrolled Annie, it was midway through third grade. Annie was “the new kid.” On her first day, the teacher distributed art supplies, and, unable to grip tightly with her left hand, Annie dropped them in front of everyone. The other kids laughed.
“Now, class,” the teacher warned, “just because a student is different, that’s no reason to act differently towards them,” which Annie knew was an invitation to do exactly that. Her self-consciousness grew.
As the weeks passed, she tried to make friends, sometimes through gifts. She snuck bags of chocolate chip cookies from home and handed them out during recess. One day she heard some girls talking about Smurf dolls, and on a trip to the store with her mother, she shoplifted a box of them, hiding them under her sweatshirt. She gave those out, too—until a teacher noticed and called Annie’smother, who was mortified and dragged Annie back to the store and made her apologize to the manager.
All through fourth grade, and much of fifth and sixth, Annie had to wear splints to keep her fingers straight. The ugly purple scars drew looks, and Annie developed a habit of hiding her left hand whenever possible—behind her back, in a jacket pocket, shielded by a notebook. She often wore long sleeves despite the Arizona heat.
Her mother insisted she do her rehabilitation exercises multiple times a day, making the thumb touch each finger, as if forming the OK sign. She did these at her desk, hoping no one would notice, until the time she got in an argument with a girl named Tracy.
“OK, Annie, OK!” Tracy yelled, mimicking the signs with her hands. Others laughed. It became Annie’s nickname, “OK Annie.” Most of the kids called her that now.
Paulo—the boy she met during leapfrog—never did. Annie felt safe around him. He smiled a lot and seemed confident. One day, in the cafeteria, he leaned over and lifted her hand into his, without even asking.
“It’s not that bad,” he said.
“It’s gross,” she replied.
“I’ve seen worse.”
“Where?”
“I saw a picture of a guy who got attacked by a bear.Thatwas gross.”
Annie almost laughed.
